Lost In Translation forever let the cat out of the bag about American celebrities getting paid ungodly amounts of money to promote products in Japan, where a silly or embarrassing spokesperson gig wouldn’t have the same power to tarnish their image as it would back home. Who knows how many undiscovered gems there are out there?
I recently came across this random YouTube suggestion (which I’m sure has been featured somewhere before, though it didn’t have that many views and I hadn’t seen it), featuring James Brown singing a fresh version of “Get On Up,” entitled, I believe… “Miso’n Up.” According to the description it comes from 1992, when Brown would’ve been 59. I don’t speak Japanese, but it appears to be a commercial for a Miso-flavored ramen noodle cup from Nissin. True to his moniker, The Hardest Working Man In Show Business, James Brown rocks the hell out of a song about noodles. Just try this with today’s stars. Heck, Lorde probably wouldn’t even have the pipes to blow the steam off those noodles, let alone finish the whole song. (I think. I honestly don’t know a thing about today’s stars but I did hear Lorde in a commercial once.)
Anyway, as good as Chadwick Boseman was in it, the James Brown biopic would’ve been at least 65% better if it had included the day in James Brown’s life that he spent recording a song about noodles.
Here’s another one: